Portable computing devices such as Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), Pocket Personal Computers (PPCs), Handheld PCs (HPCs) herein generally referred to as “handheld devices” are readily available in the market place. These devices have a substantially smaller form factor than other portable computer devices such as laptop computers and, accordingly, are becoming increasingly popular. Notwithstanding, their small form factor, these handheld devices have relatively high processing capabilities and may interact with a variety of more powerful computers running sophisticated software applications accessing large databases.
However, due to their small form factor, these handheld devices include relatively small display screens. For example, certain PDAs typically include a touch display screen of 240×320 pixels, and certain so-called “handheld PCs” include a small keyboard and a display screen of 640 ×240 pixels. Bearing in mind that information displayed must be easily read by a user, such small display screens clearly create difficulties in presenting the information to the user. The information presented to the user may, in addition or instead, be in a form which defines input fields for user input e.g., via a touch screen, keyboard or the like.
For the purposes of this specification, the term “display zone” should be interpreted broadly to define so-called “windows” on a display screen, “frames” on a display screen, or the like. Thus, broadly, a display zone defines part of display real estate or available display area on a display screen.